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Investigating the course of L1 SASL development and L2 Afrikaans reading development in young deaf children following a newly introduced curriculum with SASL as both LoLT and school subject

Steyn, Minna A. (2015-12)

Thesis (MA)--Stellenbosch University, 2015.

Thesis

ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Reading skills of Deaf schoolchildren in the United States of America are reported to be significantly below those of their hearing peers. In South Africa, Deaf learners’ prospects of attaining high levels of literacy are even bleaker. This fact gave rise to the current study, which examines the impact of a newly introduced Curriculum Assessment Policy Statements (CAPS) curriculum with South African Sign Language (SASL) both as a school subject and as language of learning and teaching on (i) the course of language development in SASL and (ii) early reading development in second language (L2) Afrikaans amongst young Deaf learners.
The expressive language (SASL) of four participants with various home language backgrounds (some with signing, Deaf parents; others with hearing, non-signing Afrikaans- or English-speaking parents) was regularly video-recorded over a period of three years, from the beginning of their pre-Grade R (i.e., Grade 0) year until the end of their Grade 1 year. These learners all started reading at the beginning of Grade 1, but were exposed to SASL for varying periods prior to that. The language development (in terms of handshape and discourse skills) and literacy development (reading comprehension) of the participants were qualitatively analysed based on the recordings.
Despite the diverse circumstances of the four participants in terms of date of diagnosis, length of exposure to SASL and age of first exposure, parental mastery of SASL, and length of attendance of the school in which the SASL curriculum was piloted, they all showed notable progress in terms of SASL acquisition over the course of the study period, and they all managed to acquire reading skills up to the level expected of a Grade 1 learner. As was found for hearing users of a spoken language, language competence appears to be a prerequisite for the development of literacy skills in Deaf children (see Adams 1990; Gathercole and Baddeley 1993). The assumption is that the four children studied here were successful readers in their L2 (despite Deaf children usually finding the acquisition of reading skills very challenging) because they had sufficiently developed first language (SASL) skills as a foundation for literacy acquisition. The participants’ phonological, morphological, syntactic, semantic and pragmatic knowledge of SASL appeared to have “come together” by the time they reached Grade 1, although these were not necessarily taught explicitly. This, again, enabled the acquisition of grade-appropriate reading skills in the L2.
The findings of this study indicate the potential benefit of early intervention for Deaf children and that the SASL CAPS curriculum ought to be introduced at the time of enrolment in a school for the Deaf (i.e. from age three years onwards), and not only in Grade R.